CHICO >> Size, skill, shooters — in the end, the Corning High boys basketball team's second consecutive Northern Section title was a result of all those things, and a whole lot of experience in winning ballgames.

Chayce Maday scored a game-high 21 points, Nick Hoag added 15 and the Cardinals beat Gridley 56-49 on Saturday night at Acker Gym for the Division IV championship, the second year in a row for Corning.

For the senior trio of Maday, Hoag and Michael Shoemaker, who scored 12 points and had seven blocks, it was the perfect Northern Section career finisher for a group that has gone 76-11 at the varsity level.

"Those guys are used to winning," Corning coach Bill Mache said. "This is still a special accomplishment."

Maday's balanced scoring paced the Cardinals (24-4) throughout, while big spurts elsewhere led Corning to the title against upset-minded Gridley (16-12), which gave its opponent a battle the whole way but couldn't complete the uphill climb.

"Gridley was physical," Shoemaker said. " They have really good shooters, they were well-prepared for us and they gave us a run for our money."

Using the same clog-the-middle zone that worked so sublimely in the semifinal against Orland, the Bulldogs made it clear they didn't come to Acker to be bullied by the defending champions. But the going certainly wasn't easy.

Clearly outsized, Gridley showed no trepidation in the opening stages of the game, moving ahead 9-6 until two straight Shoemaker buckets gave the Cardinals the lead, one that was 13-11 after the opening 8 minutes. Corning moved ahead 19-13 on two Maday 3-pointers, but Gridley answered right back with buckets from Quinn Spring and Samuel Cota to draw to within a point before Shoemaker dropped in another layup to make it a 6-point game by halftime.

"We knew Gridley was a well-coached team and they play with discipline," Mache said. "We just had to do our stuff, not get outside of ourselves and do what we do."

Again, Gridley kept things within reach in the third period, with two 3s from Emery Haddy cutting the Cardinals' advantage to 2 points again, but another 3 from Maday and two short jumpers from Hoag restored a 36-28 cushion for Corning. Then, the Cardinals started to pull away in the fourth quarter as Hoag continued to pick up steam. Held to two first-half points, he had 11 in the first 11 minutes of the second half and his team built its lead to 41-31 inside of 6 minutes.

"Any time they devote that much effort to defending the middle of the lane, you've got to hit some shots, and we did that," Mache said. "But we took good shots, and didn't settle. We shot after we penetrated with a pass or dribble, we moved the ball around, and if you do that you can usually break a zone down."

When that margin still hovered around the double-digit threshold, Gridley started fouling, and the 2-minute drill gave them hope. An explosion of points from Shobi Khan in the fourth quarter — he had a quick 12 in the period, almost all of it in the game's final 3 minutes — got the Bulldogs to within 6.

But Corning was clinical from the free-throw line, knocking down 13 of 18, and time simply ran out on Gridley.

"It's definitely nice to do it again," Shoemaker said. "My teammates all stepped up, and now it's time to go celebrate with them."